A Poll: Of those who have tried special diets for kids with autism, have they worked?

Question

Any other details like;

boy or girl?

low functioning or high functioning?

How long did it take to start helping?

Whay kind of improvements did you see?

If they didn't work, how long did you try?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/;_ylc=X3oDMTE1MmI4N2IyBF9TAzIxMTU1MDAxMTgEc2VjA2Fuc19ub3QEc2xrA3N1YmplY3Q-;_ylv=3?qid=20071017142517AASIYlr

Thanks so much!

Answer 1

I tried the CFGF diet with my son twice.  The first time when he was five years old and I wasn't as familiar with autism and or the biomedical treatments.  I was not very strict in implementation and quit after 3 months since I did not see any change.  Aggressive behavior later escalated and I was desperate to try again at age 6, this time being very strict--absolutely no dairy or gluten.  I quit after four months of no change.  I do know several families who say that they have tried this diet and showed improvement.  (I believe them too).  Unfortunately no single solution works for everyone.  My son was high functioning at age 4 but has not improved much and now would be considered lower functioning and he did not go through a period of regression that many others do.  the kids that I have noticed improve in that they are less agitated and tend to be able to focus better.  Their parents also claim that intestinal problems have reduced.  (My son did not seem to have intestinal problems).

Answer 2

We removed milk and saw results within two days. We had him tested for dairy allergies. No allergy. Huh? So we reintroduced milk. His behavior deteriorated within hours.

We removed then reintroduced milk 3 times and without a doubt milk causes his behavior to change. He stimms more, he has serious temper tantrums, he hits-and without warning. he has less eye contact and interacts with us less. His stools get runnier.  We don't seem to have the same problem with cheeses.

Milk is poison to our son. He is much happier and our entire household is much better off since we figured this out.

Contrary to some of the posters above I have encountered many parents and special ed teachers, as well as our speech and occupational therapist who have seen improvements when dietary restrictions have been used in children on the spectrum.

This statement from above is total fear mongering hogwash "However, there's no scientific evidence that this is true or that restricting these foods improves autism. Furthermore, restrictive diets can result in nutritional deficiencies in growing children".  There are thousands of parents and doctors and teachers and therapists around the world that will tell you dietary changes can make a HUGE improvment in these childrens lives.

Dietary changes do not ALWAYS work, NOTHING ALWAYS WORKS! They do however often work and in some case (like ours) the difference is life changing.

Biomedical Intervention has helped our son even more than removing milk. I advise you to go to the link and learn.

Good Luck!  



http://www.generationrescue.org/

Answer 3

I tried CFGF with my daughter.  She's classified as having severe autism--she's not exactly non-verbal, but she doesn't really talk.

We did it for about a year and saw no improvement in her behavior.  Whether it improved her health or not is debatable.

Personally I think there are sub-sets within autism.  This diet maybe helps those with true "leaky guy" syndrome and other gut problems.  In the end I don't think my daughter suffered from that so the diet didn't help her.

I wish there were more conclusive tests to tell us who would benefit most from this diet.

Answer 4

I don't have an autistic child, but I have worked with a huge number of ASD children. It is the consensus of teachers that diet does not make a difference. This includes high and low functioning kids. Often teachers are informed by parents about dietary restrictions, so they do know when kids are on these diets.

There's no evidence that special diets, such as restricting certain foods, are an effective treatment for autism.

Autism is a complex brain disorder that has no known cure. For this reason, many frustrated parents turn to unproven alternative treatments in an attempt to help their children. The most popular of these alternative treatments are diets that eliminate gluten or casein, or both.

Proponents of restrictive diets believe that casein, a protein found in dairy products, and gluten, a protein found in many grains, affect brain development and behavior, causing autism in some children. However, there's no scientific evidence that this is true or that restricting these foods improves autism. Furthermore, restrictive diets can result in nutritional deficiencies in growing children.

The most important aspect in working with children with autism is to work with increasing their ability to communicate! Many behavior issues go away when children can communicate their needs.

No diet on earth can replace this kind of training. The best approach to improving communication is Applied Behavior Analysis. To learn more, put "Verbal Behavior" in Google and you will get some valuable info.

Answer 5

I have a son who has autism but I have not tried the diet with him because he has feeding issues at this time. I have done research on the diet and would like to share with you some info I have found.

In the gfcf diet  it's recommended to remove the casein first then the gluten. A child goes through withdrawal when the items are removed from their diet, so their characteristics actually worsen before they improve. It can take about 3 days for casein to be completely out of the childs system. The gluten takes about 6 months to be completely out of the childs system that is why it is suggested to try the diet for a minimum of 6 months.

With gluten you have to consider many different things, it can be found in other products besides food, such as shampoos, toothpastes, sunscreens, lotions, playdoh, etc. Gluten also has many different names. You really have to get good at reading those lables on everything you buy.  Foods that are not made with gluten can still have gluten on them, in food processing plants often the conveyor belt is sprayed to help prevent foods from sticking to it, the sprays contain gluten; so even though the food itself wasn't made with gluten it now has gluten on it.

What works with one child may not work with another, the diet may work in some children but not all, and even though 2 children may have the same characteristics of autism they both may not see the same results from the diet.

Answer 6

With my low functioning daughter, we tried the GFCG diet. we thought we did really great and that after two months it had no effect and quit. A few years later we had a son who honestly is allergic to wheat and we discovered how very pervasive wheat is and how very sensitive kids can be. Certain toothpastes, shampoos, and playdough make him react. And ironically enough, when he has a wheat infraction, he's very much like a child with aspergers (of which I have also)

Anyway, we did discover that corn products push her completely over the edge. She's by no means cured, but off of corn, she can focus on people and is much more aware of the world. She's more capable of scripted (and more lately, independent) speaking and self-care. This is substantiated by our teachers, who did not know we pulled her off of corn, but were amazed by the progress she made the first month off of it. It too is pervasive, there's only one brand of store bread without corn, and there's very few breakfast cereals or prepared foods that don't have corn starch, corn syrup or corn flour. We've been thinking about trying the gluten free diet again, esp now that she's older and has a wider range of food that she'll eat. It's very obvious when she has corn, she starts giggling uncontrollably, can't communicate even nonverbally, and eventually gets frustrated, angry and aggressive. She starts self mutilation.

My oldest son has aspergers, and based on the behavior of the younger son when he gets wheat, I'd like to try to GF diet. However, he's old enough and high functioning enough to choose. His words exactly were that he'd 'rather be dead than wheat-free'. It's hard. The replacement food tastes like c**p. Even cutting the family half back leaves me dreaming about hot bread with butter. lol!

Answer 7

We tried ..failed as welll Thomas is nine and has severe autism non verbal also, his diet is very limited we stopped what he was eating to try the new diet that we were given he refused to eat ..so we were told to give back his diet that he was used too, depends on the child and how severe they are if they wil take to a new diet there is no harm in doing this.